Season's End
by miscreant rose
Summary: Drabble from the following prompt: "Can I request a drabble, my friend? Perhaps a passionate kiss between Mary and Charles? :D" Set at the end of Rose's London Season, just before Mary heads home. After a night of dinner, and perhaps dancing, there is conversation at Grantham House, and this eventual goodnight. Part of the "Seasons" verse of my Mary/Charles fic


**_The usual suspect is to blame for this: Lala-Kate sent me the following prompt on tumblr: "Can I request a drabble, my friend? Perhaps a passionate kiss between Mary and Charles? :D ~ LalaKate"_**

**_And the next thing I know, my 'Seasons' Charles and Mary invade my brain and take over my feels and leave me a wibbly pool of jello on the floor. They are brutal to me, these two. Set at the end of Rose's London Season, just before Mary heads home. After a night of dinner, and perhaps dancing, there is conversation at Grantham House, and this eventual goodnight._**

**_Don't worry, Lala-Kate and Cls2011 have already put in the request for the next installment and the removal of clothes. If you don't hear from me again, check my hard-drive - i have a feeling writing that will kill me. _**

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**Season's End**

There was only a single lamp still lit as they passed into the foyer at the late — or rather, early— hour. Just the two of them, as she had waved Carson off an hour ago, insisting she could see Mr. Blake out on her own. Only they had fallen back into conversations that didn't want to end. He coaxed stories from her, comments hinting that their paths had brushed aside each other for much longer than she ever realized. The same circles, the familiar acquaintances, seasons missed by only a few years.

And a war.

Her fingers twisted and played with the long string of jet black beads at her front, her steps slowing with what was becoming a familiar reluctance. Too easily she could slip into letting this man in, to wanting to know everything about him, to find some piece of herself she was having a hard time being without.

More and more, she could feel those tendrils of him creeping around her, making her aware of the hollow place when he wasn't there.

He paused, looking down before suddenly turning, taking her free hand in both of his. Fingers fidgeting as much as hers, thumb stroking back and forth across the back of her hand, the fingers of his other hand dancing a light pattern over the delicate bones of her bare wrist. That velvet gaze of his captured hers, stirring again her desire to just give in to it and all the warmth it held.

"Mary."

Unconsciously, she steps closer, firmly entering that intimate space of shared breaths, the gentlest of murmurs, the exchange of a spicy musk and a crisp citrus scent, of almost sensing the warm pulse of the other.

Her necklace falls still as her hand reaches up to trace the lines of his cheek, the edge of his lips. Cool for too long, they beg to learn new patterns, new textures, to warm against a new breath. She watches the warm hold of his stare, at first nervous flashing to surprise, now darkening with amber tones to what lurks beneath his surface. Longing, hunger, a fierceness of promise.

She feels his intake of breath, the start of a sound, a word to stop her, to still this, and she silences him with her lips, still watching his gaze under her lowered lashes.

The softness of his lips is unexpected, the taste of him an exciting surprise, rich and sweet with just a hint of tart. Need she didn't know she had hidden away flashes to life, and she opens her mouth against his more firmly, her hand now grasping the back of his neck to pull him closer, her other twining fingers into his, a silent plea to hold her there, keep her safe.

He answers her with the heat and pull of his own mouth, his free hand reaching around to draw her in against him. The heat of his hand splayed across the small of her back stirs flutters down her spine, and her knees feel shaky as she clings even tighter to him. A noise somewhere between a growl and a moan rumbles from the back of his throat. In a flash, her imagination runs wild with it, the sudden vision or sense of the sound of him, the feel of him above her, barriers of silk and cotton and linen stripped away, nothing to hold to but shared expanses of skin.

Shivering with electric charge, her body flames to life with an urgency long forgotten, the wave of desire breaking across her so strong it nearly knocks her breathless. She has to swallow back a sob as her fingernails dig into him, her mouth desperate, biting and tugging harder at his. He answers her challenge with his own, arms holding her closer, not letting her slip away, tightening his grip as she fights the need to want to crawl inside his skin. Tongues challenge each other, sparing as their words once had, but this time in a dance of united need, fierce one moment, then gentling to warm velvet caresses the next.

She doesn't remember the wall coming up to press against her back. Eyes flutter open for a moment, but see nothing but the fire in his eyes, a look of such pure, unbridled honesty of his devotion, such intensity of emotion she feels the air still in her lungs. Intimate, sacred, she knows it is a look only she has ever seen, a truth, a level of want never before shared with another in his arms; if any other woman had seen that raw exposure of his soul, they would never have let him go. She could live for that look, exist for the chance to see it every waking moment of every day, to feel it against her skin, the caress of it against her soul.

Fingers come up to brush across her cheek, imprinting the pull of him even more firmly onto her. Eyes drift shut once more as he leans in to her, her mouth still thirsty for him. But the brush of his hair against her jaw startles her for the split second before she feels the heat of his tongue at the hollow of her throat. Her breath catches once more as her body spirals even deeper into its pulsing need as his hot, wet, careful caress traces and retraces the base of her throat, lips finally closing over her skin there, marking her anew with his hungry pull. Hands knot in his hair, holding him for balance, holding him for need. His mouth makes a slow exploration up the column of her throat, tongue tasting and heating, teeth brushing against her skin with the promise of a nip but never delivering, then lips sealing each spot with expert caresses that reach to her very center, stoking those forgotten needs even higher, discovering ones she never knew could even exist.

She wants to offer every inch of her flesh to the talents of his mouth.

"Charles."

It is more a sigh than a word. She feels him tense, slowing, just a slight distancing as he breathes his own sigh against her. A soft kiss against her jaw, the flutter of his lips against her cheek, another at her temple as he pulls her into where she can kiss his neck. She trembles as she fights to calm her racing pulse, to steady her panting breath. Ripples of desperate want still break through her, her fingers flexing to grasp him closer. Time needs to stop for just a moment more, just another taste.

"I've forgotten what I wanted to say," he murmurs softly.

She lifts her mouth slowly from his neck. "Really? I thought it was a rather eloquent statement you made."

His chuckle against her surges and echoes every flaming nerve in her body.

"Persuasive?"

She relishes the shiver the sound of his voice elicits in her. Thumbs caress hypnotically along his neck, her hands not ready to be idle, her body not ready to be untouched, bereft of the press of him against her, the heat of him wrapped around her. "Quite persuasive." Her voice is a gentle hum in the space between them.

He nuzzles his nose gently against hers, his fingers still trailing gentle swirls on her cheek. "Perhaps before any more persuasion, I should go."

Her brow furrows as she strokes her hand through his unruly waves. Daring thoughts of sneaking him to her room flash across her mind, and the still simmering passion pooling in her core quivers again. She needs rational thought, and yet, all she can do is tilt her head once more, her lips seeking his, leaving her question there.

"Why?"

His mouth brushes across her seeking lips, teasing her, just out of reach.

"What was it you said? It's always nice to leave something for next time?"

She can't help the laugh that slips out of her, mixing with his deep chuckle. With a kiss on her forehead, he is suddenly gone from enfolding her, her knees giving way a bit as the cool chill of the foyer collides against her heated skin, leaving her to lean into the wall behind her to keep from collapsing.

Restless hands back to her necklace, the string of beads twisting tightly around her fingers, and only her gaze left to caress him. The look he gives her tells her he feels that caress, that he relishes it, and he is just as unready as she to say goodnight.

Shrugging on his coat, he finds his hat and gloves to occupy his fidgeting grasp. For now.

"Until next time, Mary."


End file.
